A LADYBUG IN MY EAR
by Tribeca
Summary: It all started when he ask her to look and see if there was a ladybug in his ear. One shot.


A LADYBUG IN MY EAR

**A/N: So yesterday I watched The Weekend Vortex (Season 5 Episode 19) for the third time. Every time I watch it I just love when Penny talks about Sheldon making her check his ear for a ladybug. It makes me happy. It's just a four second conversation between the two of them and if you sneeze you'll miss it. And though they never show the actual scene, I can just see it in my mind…Penny up close and personal peering into Sheldon's ear looking for said ladybug. And so, without further ado, here is my version of what really happened when Penny checked Sheldon's ear for a ladybug. **

**Enjoy and please leave feedback so I know what you think. It helps when I'm sitting here staring at a blank screen! **

***I do not own any part of The Big Bang Theory or any Ladybugs***

"Penny, I'm sorry to intrude on your liquor indulgence and bad movie watching but I need your assistance."

She sighed and stepped back to allow him entrance to her apartment. While he turned to close the door, she leaned across the sofa to grab the remote and snap the television off. He was right; it really was a bad movie. But she wasn't drinking liquor and she made a point of letting him know it. He just shrugged.

"What is it Sheldon? And make it quick I have stuff to do."

He surveyed the room, noted the clothes and shoes and magazines and unwashed dishes strewn about, and agreed that she did have lots to do.

"Yes, I can see that a good and thorough cleaning is the order of the day."

"No, not that. I'm going to shoe shop online for a few minutes and then I have to get dressed because I'm meeting some girlfriends later. We're going out dancing."

She wiggled her hips a bit to mimic some sort of dance that he knew nothing about, causing him to blush and drop his gaze to the floor.

"Yes," he used his most condescending voice, "Just what you need, to purchase more shoes with money you don't have, consume more alcohol with which your poor liver must process and find more strange Neanderthal type men to accompany you home from Pasadena's finest bars of ill repute."

"Oh Moon Pie," she made a face at him and swatted as his arm, "always so concerned for my well being. Thanks, _Dad_."

"Dad? You said you haven't ingested any liquor. I can assure you, Penny, I am not your father. I do believe your father resides in Nebraska."

She rolled her eyes, "Sarcasm, Sheldon. It was sarcasm sweetie."

"I don't get it."

"You know, like you are saying stuff to me about buying shoes, going out to bars, bringing guys home. Like a parent? Like a dad? Get it?"

"Yes. Funny." He snorted derisively.

"Sheldon, you've got exactly ten seconds to tell me what you want before I kick you out."

He sighed and tilted his head sideways and shook it while hitting it gently with his palm, much like he did the time his brother tossed him into the lake and water flooded every orifice of his body.

"I think I have a ladybug in my ear."

"What?"

"Ohhh," he was shaking his head around and bouncing on his toes, "I said, I think I have a ladybug in my ear and I need you to get it out."

"Sheldon," she stepped towards him trying not to laugh, "what the hell are you talking about?"

"What part of ladybug in my ear don't you understand Penny? I think. I have. A ladybug. In. My. Ear."

"God, Sheldon. Just come over here to the barstool and sit down."

He did as she said, nervously scooting onto the stool and trying to control the twitching of the muscles in his face. She moved close to him and put a hand on either side of his head. The heat from her body astonished him, as no one had ever touched him in this manner and for this length of time with the exception of his mother and possibly his MeeMaw.

"Penny, you don't have to get so…_close_."

She pushed his head to the side and peered into his ear, struggling to hold him still while he twisted in an effort to get away from her.

"Listen, Sheldon. Your ear hole is inside of you, the only way for me to look in it is to get close. What do you want me to do, stand on the other side of the room and look from there? You are the one that came to me. I'm just trying to do what you ask. If you don't want me touching you, you shouldn't have come over here."

"But it's a medical emergency Penny. And it's called an ear canal, not an ear hole," he said quietly, trying to look up at her but he was unsuccessful due to her strong Nebraska man hands pushing his head down.

She ignored his comments and instead told him she couldn't see anything. What she couldn't ignore was the cute freckles splattered across his neck that led a spotted path down into the ribbing of his tee-shirt or the way his short wisps of hair played across the nape of his neck. She knew she had absolutely no business at all being this close to her ex-boyfriend's roommate.

She relaxed, but didn't release, her grip on him. She was stunned by the sudden reawakening of her attraction to him. Yeah, she had felt it the first day they met but she had stuffed it so far down inside her that it only saw the light of day when she was alone, drinking wine and listening to her secret "Songs that Remind me of Sheldon" playlist on her ipod.

He shuddered at the nearness of her. He had been crushing on her since the day she first noticed his white board. The only people that ever had noticed his white board were old professors and other scientists. But the way Penny had looked at him that day and called him a "beautiful mind" had forever changed him. He had already decided that when he got a moment alone that night he was going to call Missy and tell her about his new neighbor and ask her how to proceed in initiating a relationship with Penny. He'd never had the need or desire to have a relationship with a woman before. Penny had awakened his needs and desires. Big time.

But then his best friend and roommate had practically thrown himself at her, swooned all over the place, and even went so far as to discuss what his (imaginary) future offspring with Penny would be like. Sheldon had concluded that if someone as cool and experienced with women as Leonard Hofstadter liked Penny, then he, Sheldon Lee Cooper whom had zero coolness or experience wouldn't stand a "Snowball's chance in a cat scanner." And so he had backed off and not even challenged Leonard for Penny's affections. What a mistake that had been. Leonard's attempts to court Penny had been a dismal failure and, as Sheldon saw it, a colossal waste of their time (for all _three_ of them).

But the reality was, time had passed-five years to be exact, and he and Penny had become friends. She was his first female friend and now she was his _best friend_. Their friendship had become comfortable to the point that he was concerned that if he made his feelings for her known it might cause some disruption in the universe and everything would just crumble down around them. But now she and Leonard were not together and he and Amy had finally decided that all they would ever be was friends. And so for the first time in a long time, both Sheldon and Penny were single at the same time.

"Just, stay right there Sheldon. Let me get a flashlight so I can see better."

"Okay," he cleared his throat and straightened up when she finally let go of his head.

He glanced around her apartment and listened to her rumble through drawers as she sought her Hello Kitty flashlight. He knew where it was, could have told her exactly which drawer to look in (middle drawer of her bedside table), but he needed this time to settle himself. He needed to breathe, he needed to adjust himself (ahem), and mostly he just needed to think of the words he wanted to say to her.

"Found it," she yelled from her bedroom, then walked back towards him smiling and waving the goofy pink flashlight at him.

"Okay, come here ladybug ear," she laughed and moved closer to him.

She reached around and grabbed the side of his head and instructed him to lean over so she could get a better look. He squirmed and dropped his hands in his lap and she heard him release a soft sigh. She leaned in close, clicked the light on and positioned it over his ear.

"Sweetie, I think you are good. I don't see any ladybugs or other insects for that matter. I think I got a glimpse of that big 'ole brain of yours though," she giggled at her own joke.

"Are you sure Penny? Look again," he said and they both wondered why his voice cracked.

She pushed up on her tiptoes to get a better look, bent even closer and shined the light deeper.

"I really don't see any ladybugs Sheldon."

He reached and grasped the wrist of her hand that held the flashlight and lifted his eyes to meet hers.

"There is no ladybug Penny," he said softly.

"What?"

He slowly removed the flashlight from her hand and turned it off. The room was quiet and still and the snap of the plastic toggle switch sounded more like a gunshot than the simple click of a light being switched off.

"I…I just made that up. I made it up to be close to you," he confessed, every ounce of blood in his body relocating to his face, coloring it varying shades of pink and red. He braced himself for her reaction.

"Close to me? Why?" she whispered, feeling the first tremors of desire trickle throughout her body.

"I've wanted to be close to you for years. Today I guess I wanted it enough to do something about it."

"So you pretended to have a ladybug in your ear?"

"It was the only thing I could think of."

"Well that's a new one," she smiled.

He raised a trembling hand to her face and ghosted his fingers across her cheek. She reached for his hand and he feared for a moment that she was going to reject him, push him away. Instead, she brought his hand to her mouth and placed a gentle kiss on his palm. He slid his body around to face her and brought his other hand to her waist and tugged her towards him. She stepped closer as he relaxed his long legs and spread them apart so that she fit between them, torso to torso with him. She dropped his hand from her mouth and raised both her hands to his shoulders.

"Sheldon, are you sure? You've never said anything to me."

"It took me five years but I'm saying it to you now."

"What are you saying exactly?"

He grasped her waist, now a hand on each side, and pulled her in tighter to himself. She felt his arousal and was pretty sure she knew exactly what he was saying.

"I guess I'm saying I'd like to move to a more comfortable spot and maybe you can check me for ladybugs again."

Penny didn't go online shoe shopping or dancing with her friends that night. Instead she and Sheldon stayed in her apartment and looked for ladybugs the rest of the night.

From that moment on it always turned her on when he would whisper to her that he needed her to check his ear for ladybugs.

He whispered it to her in his apartment some nights when they were playing Halo with the boys and the two of them would make a quick retreat across the hall to her apartment. He whispered it to her sometimes when she'd visit him in his office on those nights he was working late and she'd take him there on his desk. He whispered it to her during the Nobel Prize Award Ceremony in Stockholm and they'd had to wait until they got back to their hotel room. He whispered it to her on the night he proposed to her and again on their honeymoon as they stood looking out at the sea, him behind her with his arms wrapped around her and his chin resting on her shoulder. He whispered it to her the night their child was born and she rolled her eyes and told him he'd have to wait awhile. He told her he'd wait for her forever. He whispered it to her when his hair was graying and their youth was slipping away. Penny loved checking Sheldon's ear for ladybugs. She knew exactly what he wanted.


End file.
